I donated to this (note OpenGameArt.org on the donors list).
The title is a bit confusing, and while I compeltely support their efforts, I hope people understand that OpenGameArt.org isn't directly involved. (Also, if I ever want to host a bundle campaign here, what do I call it?)
That being said, I have to congratulate them on an exemplary campaign for funding CC-licensed art work. Might be a good example of a business model OGA can use. (That is, feature some set of art, let people pay what they want, and pick their own split between the artist, charity, and a tip for OGA.)
@bart my idea was to display a certain number of tiles based on the screen resolution. So the idea is to always display, say, seven by ten tiles always, and then each image is squashed into their respective tiles. I am already using the orthographic camera, with each tile being one unit.
It sounds to me that given your choice of resolution, your ideal number of tiles would be ten across by six down, and then redo the tiles at 80x80. One problem you're having is that the aspect ratio (the ratio of the width to the height) is different in your art from what how you're drawing it on screen. Right now, your art is square, but your tiles are actually rectangles, so the images on them are going to look a bit squeezed in one direction.
Anyway, you don't have to stick with that tile size or that resolution, but for the best quality, make sure that your tiles are square and that the resolution of your art is the same size as the tiles when they are drawn on screen.
I notice there's a results link at the end. I'd like to see the results again, but I don't want to skew your survey by filling it out another time. Can you post the link here? :)
I would repsond that a video game doesn't necessarily have to allow the player to direct the plot, provided that you provide the illusion of freedom. As such, it may be interesting to procedurally generate a finite world with distinct objectives and have the player go through a plot that's determined once when they start the game.
My question is what kind of form this story would take. I'm assuming the story generation algorithm wouldn't be able to pass a turing test so, as you said, dialogue is out. The idea of "beats" as presented in those links would work fairly well, although I suspect you'd have to follow a somewhat different story structure. In the case of a roguelike, you might want to take a look at various fantasy and game plot tropes.
Probably the most appropriate plot for a roguelike is to defeat some huge bad guy, so you could use that as a starting point and then randomly pick a motivation for the main character doing so. Maybe they're saving the world, maybe they're rescuing someone, etc. Then figure out what steps are going to be required to defeat this person (or monster). Maybe you need to travel to various dungeons and collect a set of artifacts. Perhaps you need to defeat this guy's underlings first. Maybe you need to enlist the aid of a person or group of people, and in order to do that you have to help them or (if they're from a warrior culture) defeat them in battle.
I guess what I'm getting at is that in this sort of story, the "beats" should vary as well. That is, you'll probably want to randomly generate the story outline before generating the details about the parts that make it up. If you follow the exact same set of "beats" every time, you'll probably end up with stories that feel too similar structurally. (This isn't so much of an issue if you're a human writer, but it's a lot easier to pick up on these sorts of patterns when a computer is doing the writing.)
At the moment, I don't know of any game that generates random plots well, although I can think of a few that sort of attempt it.
The Sims simulates personal desires, which might result in something resembling a plot, although it's hampered by the fact that any sort of character development (romance, getting a job, etc) seems to require human initiaitve.
Dwarf Fortress probably does some sort of simulation of how the dwarves feel, but I don't know if cohesive stories form on thier own.
Skyrim can generate random quests for the player by sending them to various places to pick up various items or defeat bandits or whatever, but the main story is of course scripted, and the random quests can feel kind of fill-in-the-blank if you do enough of them.
Do you mind pasting your map drawing code on pastebin so I can take a look at it?
Your map tiles look like they're a) smaller than the tile image, which is 130x130, and b) not square. Without seeing your code, my first suggestion is to set up opengl to use an orthographic camera, with the viewport such that 1 unit = 1 pixel on the screen.
Also, to make things easier, you should probably consider using sprite sizes that are powers of two, although I don't think that's your problem here.
(1) The "preferred form for making modifications" part of the GPL (with respect to art) is at best vague and at worst completely unenforceable. For example, let's say someone makes a midi file and uploads it to the site. Someone else (who may not have access to mixing software or even a computer at the time of recording) takes the midi file and records themselves playing an accompaniment to it. So now you have an audio file that's a live instrument with the midi playing in the background. What's the preferred form for making modifications? Can the GPL be construed to prevent this sort of modification?
If the GPL prevents these sorts of modifications, it's not a great license for art. If it doesn't prevent modifications like this, then the clause about preserving a perferred form for modifications just gives the original rights holder a false sense of security. In either case, this sort of ambiguity makes the GPL a non-optimal choice as an art license.
(2) That isn't a mistake, just poor phrasing on my part. What I was getting at is that if someone wants to license their work under the MIT license, which isn't an available selection, just select the GPL and then note in the comments that they're also releasing the work under the MIT license.
hehe
Mostly it illustrates a potential confusion. My answer would be "The OpenGameArt.org Bundle", but to me that's uncomfortably similar.
Regardless, no biggie. It's not in the immediate plans anyway. :)
I donated to this (note OpenGameArt.org on the donors list).
The title is a bit confusing, and while I compeltely support their efforts, I hope people understand that OpenGameArt.org isn't directly involved. (Also, if I ever want to host a bundle campaign here, what do I call it?)
That being said, I have to congratulate them on an exemplary campaign for funding CC-licensed art work. Might be a good example of a business model OGA can use. (That is, feature some set of art, let people pay what they want, and pick their own split between the artist, charity, and a tip for OGA.)
@bart my idea was to display a certain number of tiles based on the screen resolution. So the idea is to always display, say, seven by ten tiles always, and then each image is squashed into their respective tiles. I am already using the orthographic camera, with each tile being one unit.
It sounds to me that given your choice of resolution, your ideal number of tiles would be ten across by six down, and then redo the tiles at 80x80. One problem you're having is that the aspect ratio (the ratio of the width to the height) is different in your art from what how you're drawing it on screen. Right now, your art is square, but your tiles are actually rectangles, so the images on them are going to look a bit squeezed in one direction.
Anyway, you don't have to stick with that tile size or that resolution, but for the best quality, make sure that your tiles are square and that the resolution of your art is the same size as the tiles when they are drawn on screen.
I notice there's a results link at the end. I'd like to see the results again, but I don't want to skew your survey by filling it out another time. Can you post the link here? :)
I love these sorts of discussions. :)
I would repsond that a video game doesn't necessarily have to allow the player to direct the plot, provided that you provide the illusion of freedom. As such, it may be interesting to procedurally generate a finite world with distinct objectives and have the player go through a plot that's determined once when they start the game.
My question is what kind of form this story would take. I'm assuming the story generation algorithm wouldn't be able to pass a turing test so, as you said, dialogue is out. The idea of "beats" as presented in those links would work fairly well, although I suspect you'd have to follow a somewhat different story structure. In the case of a roguelike, you might want to take a look at various fantasy and game plot tropes.
Probably the most appropriate plot for a roguelike is to defeat some huge bad guy, so you could use that as a starting point and then randomly pick a motivation for the main character doing so. Maybe they're saving the world, maybe they're rescuing someone, etc. Then figure out what steps are going to be required to defeat this person (or monster). Maybe you need to travel to various dungeons and collect a set of artifacts. Perhaps you need to defeat this guy's underlings first. Maybe you need to enlist the aid of a person or group of people, and in order to do that you have to help them or (if they're from a warrior culture) defeat them in battle.
I guess what I'm getting at is that in this sort of story, the "beats" should vary as well. That is, you'll probably want to randomly generate the story outline before generating the details about the parts that make it up. If you follow the exact same set of "beats" every time, you'll probably end up with stories that feel too similar structurally. (This isn't so much of an issue if you're a human writer, but it's a lot easier to pick up on these sorts of patterns when a computer is doing the writing.)
At the moment, I don't know of any game that generates random plots well, although I can think of a few that sort of attempt it.
Do you mind pasting your map drawing code on pastebin so I can take a look at it?
Your map tiles look like they're a) smaller than the tile image, which is 130x130, and b) not square. Without seeing your code, my first suggestion is to set up opengl to use an orthographic camera, with the viewport such that 1 unit = 1 pixel on the screen.
Also, to make things easier, you should probably consider using sprite sizes that are powers of two, although I don't think that's your problem here.
(1) The "preferred form for making modifications" part of the GPL (with respect to art) is at best vague and at worst completely unenforceable. For example, let's say someone makes a midi file and uploads it to the site. Someone else (who may not have access to mixing software or even a computer at the time of recording) takes the midi file and records themselves playing an accompaniment to it. So now you have an audio file that's a live instrument with the midi playing in the background. What's the preferred form for making modifications? Can the GPL be construed to prevent this sort of modification?
If the GPL prevents these sorts of modifications, it's not a great license for art. If it doesn't prevent modifications like this, then the clause about preserving a perferred form for modifications just gives the original rights holder a false sense of security. In either case, this sort of ambiguity makes the GPL a non-optimal choice as an art license.
(2) That isn't a mistake, just poor phrasing on my part. What I was getting at is that if someone wants to license their work under the MIT license, which isn't an available selection, just select the GPL and then note in the comments that they're also releasing the work under the MIT license.
From what you said so far, it could be any number of things, so:
Design is somewhat borrowed from my avatar pic.
On the other hand, with wings3d, you're not likely to be able to achieve this sort of render.
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